Why was it named Precision Teaching?

Last Updated on Wednesday, 20 June 2007 14:36 Written by SCS Administration Wednesday, 20 June 2007 13:49

[Question and Answer contributed by Dr. Ogden Lindsley, September 2000.]

Ogden Lindsley (1972, Page 9) named Precision Teaching because "what was really new in our procedure was precision, we decided to use that as an adjective in front of whatever it was one was doing: hence in our case, "precision teaching." Lindsley (1971) hoped that the standard recording and charting system would be used throughout the behavioral fields as Precision School Psychology, Precision Social Work (Green & Morrow, 1972), Precision Speech Therapy (Johnson, 1972), and so on. The field experts would keep their name as the noun and use the adjective "precision" to describe the method standard to all.

REFERENCES

Green, J. K. & Morrow, W. R. (1972). Precision Social Work: general model and illustrative student projects with clients. Education for Social Work, 8, Fall, 19-29.

Johnson, T. S. (1972). Precision therapy is the way to go. In J. B. Jordan & L. S. Robbins (Eds.), Let's try doing something else kind of thing: Behavioral principles and the exceptional child (pp. 40-50). Arlington, VA: Council for Exceptional Children.

Lindsley, O. R. (1972). From Skinner to Precision Teaching: The child knows best. In J. B. Jordan & L. S. Robbins (Eds.), Let's try doing something else kind of thing: Behavioral principles and the exceptional child (pp. 1-11). Arlington, VA: Council for Exceptional Children. (page 9)

Lindsley, O. R. (1971). Precise behavioral management system. In M.C. Reynolds (Ed.) Proceedings of the Conference on Psychology and the Process of Schooling in the Next Decade: Alternative Conceptions (pp. 121-130). Minneapolis: University of Minnesota, Dept. of AudioVisual Extension.